young enough not to know
by Marvelgeek42
Summary: Ben's conversations with one girl in Iceland are different. Her name is Riley Gunnarsdóttir and she swears that one day she will be among the greatest musicians the world has ever seen. [Netflix verse of TUA; Part 2 of "people who don't believe in champions"]


**You can thank _The Crownless Queen_ for this particular idea.**

* * *

**_young enough not to know_**

* * *

After the Umbrella Academy goes public, the Hargreeves kids get letters from excited kids all over the world that want to be _just like them_.

(They don't know what their lives actually entails. They don't know about the training, about the schedules, about the lack of affection or anything else on the long list of things Ben could name here.

They just know about the publicity, about the admiration, and have a warped idea of what this whole fighting crime thing actually is like.

That does not explain why no adult says anything, but Ben only really comprehends that issue years later.)

Dad — is he, though? — actually gives the letters to them, on designated days. Always the last Friday of the month.

There is close to no doubt in most of their siblings — Luther is the only one that still completely believes in their father, even if Diego and Allison haven't _quite _given up hope — that either Pogo or Mom had talked the man into it. They disagree on which of the two it had been, but in the end, it doesn't really matter who is responsible for having actual contact with the outside world as much as that they have it, does it?

The thing is, the siblings don't get an equal amount of letters.

(Ben truly wishes it wasn't like this. But he is not surprised by this at all.)

Luther — Spaceboy, the only one who had gotten to pick his own pseudonym — gets the most, closely followed by Diego and Allison and then Five. Klaus and Ben don't get many letters at all — in fact, they sit at the side during the letter opening almost as much as Vanya does — and Ben even less than Klaus.

It's fine, really. He doesn't mind.

(Except he does.

He just knows better than to say it out loud.)

This just means that he cherishes each and every letter all that much more and that he can actually reply to all of them instead of having to pick and choose.

That's kind of nice.

Right?

* * *

Most of the time, they don't reply or don't get replies back, but that's to be expected.

Ben's conversations with one girl in Iceland are different.

Her name is Riley Gunnarsdóttir and she swears that one day she will be among the greatest musicians the world has ever seen.

(Ben wants to introduce her to Vanya, he just can't figure out a way to start that conversation without making it sound like he is bragging about receiving fan mail.

In retrospect, he really wishes he had taken that brief moment of embarrassment and given both of them the chance to be less alone.

But that is later, after he dies.)

Ben replies to her letter and gets another one back, which is something he honestly had not seen coming.

It's nice.

He replies to that letter as well and before he knows it, he has an actual _friend_.

(Dad probably would have disapproved, if he had taken enough time to notice multiple of Ben's letters — almost all of them really — have come from the same person.

He quietly thanks Mom that she never mentions it.)

Having a friend is great, he can actually talk about things that don't have anything to do with missions or training, things that actually interest him.

It's not as if he never shares moments like these with his siblings.

Sometimes, he joins Vanya, Allison, and Klaus when they sit together and paint their nails, but these sessions become rarer and rarer and stop by the time they are fourteen.

Sometimes, Ben and Five talk about the universe and how it works.

Sometimes, he watches Luther put together his model airplanes and listen to his explanations.

Sometimes, Diego and he read comics together.

Sometimes, they all go to Griddy's.

In the end, they are all still mostly on their own and drift apart further every day.

It's different with Riley.

(And as much as he tries to deny it, it's nice to have something completely on his own.)

* * *

Talking with Riley really is nice.

He learns about the outside world and how it actually functions.

He discovers that Dad is even worse of a parent than he previously thought.

(It always sounds so different when Riley talks about her father.

It sounds really nice.)

But they also talk about books they've both read and movies they have both seen.

Riley gives him music recommendations — all of which Ben loves when he gets the chance to listen to them — and in return, Ben offers her fun facts he's pretty sure aren't taught to normal children.

* * *

Then, one day, Five vanishes into nothingness.

Ben writes another letter, even though his previous one had just been sent the day before.

In her reply, Riley shares that she has recently lost her mother.

She knows how it feels to lose someone, even if Five is not definitely dead.

Riley also tells him that, years ago, she had met one of the _hidden people_ in a cave on a beach and that she believes she has been hexed and her mother's death is her fault.

(Years later, they discover for a fact that that is not what happened at all.

But by that point, Riley has already lost more people.

And she blames herself for the deaths of all three of them.)

* * *

He's been warned multiple times against mentioning Vanya to anyone — he does not want to know what his father classifies as a severe punishment at all — and he's just scared enough not to mention her to Riley.

Or perhaps he's just selfish enough to want to keep this connection to himself.

It doesn't matter in the end.

Oh, he does decide to finally break out under Dad's thumb and do something for his sister's happiness.

Only…

Only that it is too late.

He makes his choice on the way to the mission he does not return from alive.

* * *

There is one final letter from Riley that Ben only sees with Klaus's help.

He figures it must have been sent before the news of his death got out, probably even before he had died.

And he wishes desperately he could have received it before. It probably would have helped, if the murmurs from the Being still connected to him are any indication.

.

_Hey Ben,_

_So, before I get distracted replying to the rest of your letter, I need to ask you something I've actually been trying to ask for a while now. Please don't be mad, I'm only trying to understand._

_Isn't it kind of rude to call them The Horror? I don't know, it just seems unfair to assume it's bad. I mean, I get that we're all really small by comparison, but if this Being is connected to you, wouldn't that mean it cares at least to a point?_

_Maybe you've already tried all this, I don't know. I felt like I should mention it, I hope I didn't upset you or anything._


End file.
